47 Gairdini Lein
Raheny
Dublin 5
Republic of Ireland
Dear Jonathan Rubin,
I am a recent gradate of the University of Warwick. I completed my PhD in Philosophy
in September 2002. I wrote my dissertation on Nietzsche’s epistemology and metaphysics
under the supervision of Dr. Peter Poellner. I presented a paper to the UK Nietzsche
Society in September 2001. I am interested in presenting another such paper at the
forthcoming annual conference. Please find enclosed an abstract of my proposed paper
for your consideration. If you require a copy of same through the post please let me
know.
Yours Sincerely,
Tsarina Doyle.
Nietzsche and the reciprocity of Art and Science
It is sometimes argued that Nietzsche adopts an “aesthetic” approach to the question of
knowledge. This view suggests that Nietzsche is not ultimately concerned with the
epistemic value of our beliefs and that he is more concerned with the life-enhancing
power of those beliefs. Thus, there is, in the secondary literature, a predominantly anticognitive understanding of Nietzsche’s interest in aesthetics. Supporters of this anticognitive reading look to The Birth of Tragedy for support where Nietzsche defines his
aim as “to look at science through the prism of the artist, but also to look at art through
the prism of life.” (BT, 2). It is suggested on the basis of citations such as this one that
Nietzsche grants priority to art over science. Nietzsche, it is claimed, rejects science in
favour of art because science embodies the ascetic ideal and the view that we can obtain
disinterested objective knowledge. Thus, it is suggested that Nietzsche is more interested
in value than knowledge. This reading trades on a fundamental opposition between the
role of science and the role of art in Nietzsche’s writings.
In this paper, I will suggest that the anti-cognitive reading is complicated
somewhat by Nietzsche’s claim that “Aesthetics makes sense only as natural science: like
the Apollinian and Dionysian.” (KSA, 7 16 [6]. In view of this statement and other
similar ones drawn from Nietzsche’s early and late writings alike, I propose to show that
art and science are, for Nietzsche, reciprocal disciplines. I will argue that the relationship
between art and science is, for Nietzsche, one between imaginative conjecture ad rigorous
methodological constraint in research. In so doing, the overall aim of the paper will be to
argue that Nietzsche adopts a regulative approach to knowledge that facilitates the
making of objective claims about the nature of reality. I aim to show that when art and
science work in tandem they yield interested but objective knowledge. By this I mean
that although our knowledge is, in Nietzsche’s view, anthropocentric we are still capable
of judging that some epistemic claims are more adequate than others. It is in this vein that
I will argue that the relationship between art and science is ultimately, in Nietzsche’s
view, to be understood as the reciprocity of norms and facts.
Tsarina Doyle